


straight razor

by lucigucci



Category: The Arcana (Visual Novel)
Genre: Dom/sub, Light Masochism, M/M, Masochism, Nightmares, Sadism, Unhealthy Coping Mechanisms, Unhealthy Relationships
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-16
Updated: 2020-08-16
Packaged: 2021-03-05 21:48:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,430
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25942372
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/lucigucci/pseuds/lucigucci
Summary: (straight razor by matt maeson)Asra kicks him away, foot making contact with his throat as Julian falls back to the floor. “How dare you touch me,” he snarls.“I-- I know, I’m not worthy, I’m sorry, I’m sorry--”“I should throw you out the window,” Asra mocks. “And I would if only you wouldn’t enjoy it so damn much. The glass shards sticking into your skin, the bruises from the fall to the street-- no, I’m not about to give you that satisfaction.”Julian whimpers, scrambling back up to all fours to hide his face in shame. “I’ll do anything you ask of me, Asra.”“Ilya--”“Hate me. Hurt me. Use me. Whatever you’d like.” He brushes his hair back from his face and Asra is disturbed to see tears in his eyes along with a hopeful smile. “And I’ll be good, I swear. Good just for you.”
Relationships: Asra & Julian Devorak, Asra/Julian Devorak
Comments: 4
Kudos: 53





	straight razor

Asra is trapped in a gargantuan furnace as big as a cathedral. Red-hot flames lick his skin, smoke chokes him out, and tears stream down his face as he collapses to the ground. The floor is covered in piles of ash. He knows that these ashes were once human.

Now there’s a figure emerging from the flames, one that he knows-- knew-- so well that their mere presence is a comfort. He calls their name and they smile down at him. They even stoop to him and run their fingers through his hair. “I’m sorry,” he tries to mouth, inhaling ash at once and doubling over in a coughing fit.

“It isn’t your fault, Asra,” they tell him.

He shakes his head. No, they’re lying, he knows that it’s his fault, and they’re just trying to spare him the pain. 

“You can move on,” they say. “Really, you can. I won’t be hurt. I know how you feel about--”

“No!” he shrieks.

“Asra--”

“I won’t! I won’t let you go! I promised you!”

The flesh is being burned from his love’s bones, melting into ash, revealing their skeleton, still with that distant smile on their face. They murmur something that he can’t make out.

And in a swirl of fire, they are gone.

\--

Asra is laying in bed, drenched in icy sweat, tangled in sheets. He bolts upright. His shirt is sticking to his skin and his hair is matted. _Nightmare?_ Faust asks, winding herself around his wrist and squeezing.

“Y-yeah. It’s nothing, Faust, don’t worry.” He pets a line down one of her coils in an attempt to steady himself. This is not the first nightmare of its kind and he knows it won’t be the last. But even though he has seen this, lived this before, his limbs shake, his heart hurts, and his eyes sting with tears. 

_Tea_ , Faust suggests to him.

He tries to smile. “You’re right. Tea sounds good. Something herbal, so I can go back to sleep... like nothing happened.” Asra rises from the bed, Faust still coiled like a protective arm gauntlet against his skin. He fluffs his nightshirt and shorts to dispel some of the sweat.

He cannot see the moon tonight.

It’s rare that the Vesuvian moon hides in the clouds, hoarding her moonbeams and starchildren for herself, but tonight she is particularly greedy. Asra has to light a candle before making his way to the kitchen even though he knows the apartment like the back of his hand. The stove salamander will be irritated to be woken up this early. Maybe he should--

There’s a rustle from the shop downstairs.

Asra freezes in his tracks, every nerve on edge all at once. He should be alone. He and Faust are now the only living souls occupying the building. So what--?

He stoops and ushers Faust away from his wrist, whispering, “stay here, I’ll see what it is.”

She shoots him a worried glance before slithering away into the dark. Asra steels his resolve as he straightens up again, biting his lip, beginning the short journey downstairs on the tips of his toes. As he descends the stairs, he blows out the candle so that he can’t be seen, but the closer he is to the landing, the stronger the flickering glow of a lantern burns from the back room, normally reserved for tarot readings. Someone inside is flipping through a book from the sound of it.

“Fuck,” a familiar voice grumbles. Asra’s eyes widen.

Fear forgotten, he continues down into the store, bare feet padding on the floor like a cat’s paws, until he approaches the open doorway and leans against the frame to observe.

Julian Devorak is hunched over Asra’s reading table. He has a pile of books on the floor, one of which he holds open against the table, turning the pages at an impossible rate for him to have read. “It’s a bit early in the morning for work, don’t you think, Ilya?” Asra announces.

The doctor stumbles back, clutching his heart. “F-fuck-- Asra--”

“Don’t you know how to knock?”

Julian swallows his fear, closing the book on the desk and running a worried hand through his curls of auburn hair. “I-- sorry,” he says. “I just-- I didn’t want to ask, I was scared--”

“Scared?” Asra chuckles. “Of me?”

Julian sighs. “Sorry,” he repeats. Dejected, he begins to replace Asra’s books back on the shelf one by one, gangly limbs tense with anxiety.

“What divine providence has graced me with your presence, Ilya?” Asra inquires. When Julian doesn’t respond, Asra adds, “I was about to make some tea. I’m sure I could whip something up for you as well.”

Julian flinches as though Asra had struck him. “I wanted to look through your spellbooks… I wanted to see if you knew anything about necromancy…”

A frigid wave of realization crashes around Asra’s shoulders, pricking goosebumps on his skin. “You never know when to quit, do you?” he demands. 

“Asra--”

“They’re dead, Ilya,” he spits. “My apprentice is dead. Magic cannot and will not bring them back. Do you understand?”

Julian bows his head, quailing under Asra’s gaze. “I just thought--”

“You fool. Get out of my store.” Asra stands to the side and points Julian toward the door, but, oddly, Julian doesn’t move. “Did you hear me? I said--”

“It was my fault,” Julian yelps. He brings his gloved hands to cover his face and sinks to his knees, quivering all over. “It was my fault they died, Asra, I know it was, I left them, I didn’t pay enough attention to them when they started showing signs, I--”

“Shut up.”

Julian crawls to sit at Asra’s feet like a desperate stray dog. His pale face is blotchy from emotion under his shock of red curls. “I know you’re angry,” he presses on, voice rising into a strangled cry, “and I want to make it right, Asra, I’ll make it right for you, whatever it takes!”

“Shut. _Up_ ,” the magician snarls.

Julian presses his forehead to Asra’s bare shin, sending shivers up Asra’s spine. “Whatever it takes,” he repeats. “I love you, Asra.”

Asra kicks him away, foot making contact with his throat as Julian falls back to the floor. “How dare you touch me,” he snarls.

“I-- I know, I’m not worthy, I’m sorry, I’m sorry--”

“I should throw you out the window,” Asra mocks. “And I would if only you wouldn’t enjoy it so damn much. The glass shards sticking into your skin, the bruises from the fall to the street-- no, I’m not about to give you that satisfaction.”

Julian whimpers, scrambling back up to all fours to hide his face in shame. “I’ll do anything you ask of me, Asra.”

“Ilya--”

“Hate me. Hurt me. Use me. Whatever you’d like.” He brushes his hair back from his face and Asra is disturbed to see tears in his eyes along with a hopeful smile. “And I’ll be good, I swear. Good just for you.”

Asra scoffs and looks away. “Worthless leech,” he mutters.

“Yes-- yes, I am, I am! I don’t deserve you!” Julian returns to nuzzle his face into Asra’s leg, planting tender kisses along his skin, and this time, Asra does not kick him away.

“No, you don’t,” Asra muses.

Julian sobs gratefully into Asra’s knee. “I don’t deserve how kind you are to me, how beautiful you are, how you take pity on me--”

“Ilya.”

Julian jerks his head up to look Asra in the eyes. “Y-yes?”

Asra reaches down to brush fingers through Julian’s hair, and the doctor closes his eyes, lips parting. “If I keep you here tonight,” Asra says, “you will pretend as though nothing happened. We will keep all of this a secret. I can’t afford to have people know that I associate with you.”

“I give you my word,” Julian breathes.

A rush of adrenaline pumps through Asra’s heart, a feeling he hasn’t experienced in a long time. Because he deserves this. He deserves to take what he wants for a change instead of playing the compliant tame fox. 

_Use me._

“The safeword is starlight. Say it back.”

“S-starlight.”

Asra runs his fingers down Julian’s face, tender as a white lie, gliding his index finger around the curves of Julian’s lips. “You want me to care for you,” he croons. “You want to belong to me.”

Julian nods, closed eyelashes fluttering.

“You want me to use you for my own pleasure and throw you away when the sun rises.”

Julian nods again. A pathetic whimper resembling a “yes please” escapes between his lips.

Asra kisses Julian’s forehead before standing once more. “Then,” he says, smirking, “be a good boy and go up to bed to prepare while I clean your mess.”

Without a moment of hesitation, Julian clambers to his feet and hurtles himself up the stairs. Asra sighs. This might have been a horrible idea. If anyone found out, he would never hear the end of it, not to mention it would probably weigh on his conscience for years to come. Still he picks up the books like normal.

He lights the candle he left on the stairs once more before climbing up. Once upon a time, he promised himself he would never do something like this unless he truly wanted a lifelong relationship with his person of interest. But that was then, and this is now.

When Asra comes into view, Julian starts and blushes. He’s already naked, sitting on the bed with his hands between his knees, clothes in a messy pile on the floor a few feet away. Even his eyepatch is discarded. His sickly red sclera glints in the dim candlelight. Asra takes a moment to inspect his form before asking, “are you sure you want this?”

“I’ve never been more sure of anything in my life,” Julian answers.

Asra sighs. “Such a glutton for punishment, Ilya. You’re lucky that I’m feeling so merciful tonight.”

Julian slowly blinks up at him, inching forward on the mattress, spine curving under his pale skin. “D-does that mean,” he says, “you’ll hurt me?”

“Oh, Ilya. My Ilya.” Asra brings his hand up to caress Julian’s cheek, prompting the doctor to nuzzle his nose into his palm.

“Please,” Julian whispers.

“How would you like it? Shall I bite into your flesh and tear it from your bones?” Asra relishes the shiver that runs up Julian’s spine. He has power here, for the first time in so long, and he loves every bit of it. “Or fetch a whip and scar your back and thighs, so that you feel me every time you sit down? Perhaps I could fetch a knife from the kitchen and--”

Julian interrupts by moaning into his palm. “You’re so good to me,” he keens, “I know I don’t deserve your kindness, I know it!”

Asra leans down and traps Julian’s lips in his own. He isn’t patient when he slips his tongue between Julian’s teeth, not kind when he licks down the back of the doctor’s throat, fighting his gag reflex in favor of pain, pleasure, pain. Asra only pulls away when he needs the air. Both of them are gasping, connected by thin strings of saliva. “You’re pathetic,” Asra taunts. “Weak. Cowardly.”

“Y-yes, Asra.”

“You couldn’t leave me if you wanted to. You need me to survive.” Asra twists Julian’s curls between his fingers and tugs, pulling with them another moan from between his lips.

“I-- I would die without you!” Julian cries. “Asra! _Asra_!”

“Are you going to cum already?” Asra taunts, releasing Julian’s hair so he can shove him onto the bed. “Are you that much of a slut for pain that just talking about it makes you hard?”

Julian blushes, averting his eyes from Asra’s, fingers bunching the blankets into his fists. All he can manage is a nod. “Go on, answer!” Asra orders. He brings his hand down hard to slap the inside of Julian’s thigh. Julian yelps.

“Yes!” he gasps.

Asra kisses the mark he has just made on Julian’s pale thigh. His irritated skin is warm and soft and Asra can’t resist lapping at his wound, coaxing a low keen from Julian. “I love you!” Julian cries out.

“I thought I told you not to say that,” Asra growls.

Julian shudders. “Asra--”

“No. Don’t.” And to make his point, Asra sinks his teeth into Julian’s flesh.

Julian arches his back, squirming and twitching and wailing his ecstasy to the moonless night. “Ahh-- yes, more, hurt me, please, hurt me hurt me _break me_ \--!”

The salty bitter taste of iron floods Asra’s mouth. He bites down to hear a few more seconds of Julian’s begging before releasing him. Instead of deigning to swallow, he spits it out onto Julian’s stomach. Julian’s cock twitches. “Disgusting,” he mutters.

Julian’s chest rises and falls with deep shuddering breaths. The beginnings of tears shine in the corners of his dark eyes, those dark eyes still brimming with reverence for the man who spat on him. Asra can hear the words Julian keeps caged on the tip of his tongue without either of them having to speak it aloud.

Asra lets out a weary sigh and crawls up Julian’s body, careful not to touch him, until their faces are inches from each other. “Ilya,” he says, “why are you doing this? You know that I can’t reciprocate your feelings.”

“You don’t have to.” Julian reaches up to cup Asra’s cheek with one shaky hand. “You’re… so wonderful, Asra… so lovely… so--”

“I don’t want you to praise me like I’m a god. Just… stay quiet... and take it. Can you do that for me?”

Julian blinks up at him. He looks so innocent lying there, so completely helpless, covered in blood and spit and his own precum. “Yes, Asra,” he answers.

_Just like them. Just like when they laid in this very bed, staring up at him with unwavering affection._

Asra brushes sweaty strands of hair away from Julian’s face as he fixes his own eyes on Julian’s. He can’t think of them now. Besides, they told him that he should move on, so why shouldn’t he? Why shouldn’t he take what he wants?

He raises his hands in front of Julian’s face, stretching them along something invisible and long, and in seconds, he is holding a black leather whip. Julian’s face lights up. “Are you ready?” Asra asks.

“Yes, of course.”

“Then roll over. I’m going to make you scream so loud, you’ll wake up half the city.”


End file.
